What I'm taking away from last night's game

Last night's loss sucked, but it doesn't bother me that much. I don't have too high of hopes for the Bears this season. As long as Cutler, Forte, Olsen and Chris Williams get to play together and improve I'll be happy. The playoffs would be nice, but a loss doesn't concern me, just because I don't have huge expectations.

But here are my thoughts on last night's Bears/Packers game:

1) Devin Hester is a legitimate receiver now. That's not to say he's going to be a pro bowler, but playing against a pretty good secondary, he caught all four balls that went his way for 90 yards and a touchdown, and he made a couple of nice plays (the stiff-arm and staying in bounds on the pass near the sideline) to do it.

2) The rest of the receiving corps sucks. Earl Bennett might have some potential, but nobody besides Hester really gave Cutler any help. They cut off their routes early, resulting in some turnovers, and it seemed like anything Cutler threw that didn't hit his receivers directly in the numbers was dropped. It's hard to win games with receiver play like that.

3) The defensive line looks better. They were doing a good job hurrying Rodgers and making a lot of plays. With the linebacker corps banged up and the secondary simply not that good, that's going to be necessary to have any real success on defense this season - a good line can cover up a lot of deficiencies elsewhere, and the line may be the Bears' best defensive unit after last night's injuries. Which brings me to point four...

4) Brian Urlacher may have played his last game as a Bear. He may not have, too, this is totally speculation on my part. But if his season is really over, I wonder if he sticks around. He's still a good player, but he's an expensive one, and he's definitely not the player he once was. If he misses all of this season with an injury, I wonder if the Bears will want to start a 32-year-old middle linebacker who hasn't seen live action in a full year. I glanced at the guaranteed money in his deal and it looks like the Bears could probably cut him if they wanted to.

5) The Vikings are going to win this division going away. The Bears lost the turnover margin by 4, yet they almost won the game. The Packers' 3-4 defense is a work in progress, and their offensive line just doesn't look to be that great. Rodgers is a really good quarterback, but last night showed that if you hurry him he's not going to be very accurate. That's not surprising, but against a secondary that forces you to be more accurate than the Bears' secondary, I think things could get ugly if he has to keep throwing on the run.